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LATE ON TUESDAY evening, the Government published the Emergency Measures in the Public Interest (Covid-19) Bill 2020. Included in the Bill’s 31 sections are a series of measures affecting renters.
The emergency legislation comes as tens of thousands of low-income workers living in the private rented sector lose their jobs.
With rent payments due at the start of April tens of thousands of renters simply have no way of paying their rent. Like many people, they are extremely frightened of what the immediate future will bring.
If passed by the Oireachtas this week the Bill will prevent landlords from issuing Notices to Quit or evicting tenants for a minimum of three months. Landlords will also be prevented from increasing rents during this emergency period. All existing Notices to Quit and Residential Tenancies Board proceedings on such notices will be suspended.
The one exception will be where a landlord issued a Notice to Quit before the passing of the legislation, related to breach of contract. In such cases, the Residential Tenancies Board must have regard to the circumstances of the tenant before making a decision on whether an eviction can proceed.
The Department of Social Protection is also expected to announce a streamlined Rent Supplement payment. This is an emergency payment for people who, due to the loss of income, or their job are unable to pay their rent.
The Minister will have the power to extend these measures if the Covid-19 crisis continues.
The measures proposed will at least prevent mass evictions in the weeks ahead. The ban on rent increases and additional rent supplement payment will allow tenants to pay something towards their rent.
We needed more
While all of this is welcome it does not go far enough and there are two real concerns.
Firstly, there are many renters who do not have a tenancy agreement. They have licences or verbal agreements to rent-a-room. These, often very vulnerable tenants, must also be protected by the Bill and we will be putting forward amendments to make this happen.
Secondly, for those renters with tenancy agreements, there are growing concerns that tens of thousands of renters will accumulate substantial rent arrears debt during the emergency.
With average rents at €1200 per month statewide and €1762 in Dublin, this debt burden could be between €3000 and €6000 per renter depending on their rent levels and the length of the Covid-19 emergency.
This debt burden will not only cripple all those concerned but will also cause a real problem for the economy and the stability of the rental sector when the ban on evictions and Notices to Quit is lifted.
There is a solution. We must ensure that landlords whose tenants are unable to pay their rent get a real moratorium on their mortgages. In turn, tenants must get real rent reductions and rent waivers.
This means landlords will get some level of rent payment during the emergency period via rent supplement and the tenant will not be left with an unsustainable debt when the Covid-19 restrictions are lifted.
A huge number of these renters worked in low or modest paid jobs. There is no guarantee that they will get those jobs back or if they do that their wages will be at the level they were previously. Even if they do return to previous wage levels their income would not be able to sustain the level of debt that could accumulate.
The government must plug this gap
Renters can not be left to carry this debt burden by themselves. We need Government, banks and landlords to work with renters to ensure that the cost of this crisis is fairly shared. Rent reductions and waivers are the only way to ensure this.
Last night the Dáil debated a number of opposition amendments including a Sinn Féin proposal to deal with this rent arrears debt burden. Now, the Government must work with opposition TDs and organisations representing tenants, landlords and lenders to come up with a solution to this issue.
Our amendment explicitly calls for rent reductions and rent waivers to be considered as part of any such package. The amendment will be voted on in the Seanad later this morning. Let’s hope the Oireachtas does the right thing by hard-pressed renters.
Sinn Féin TD for Dublin Mid-West and spokesperson on Housing, Planning & Local Government.
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The majority of landlords in Ireland own one rental property. They are generally regular normal people with many pensioners relying on it for their income. The article here suggests if they don’t have a mortgage on the property they should simply lose the income. It suggests all their tenants are low paid too. While I understand the sentiments no industry should be expected to take the brunt of the lost income. Electricity and food aren’t being given free which are huge companies while small landlords will be expected to give their services for free. There has to be government assistance in paying rent not landlords subsidising people like a social service.
@Craic_a_tower: I get where you’re coming from but the majority of people are going to be affected here and we need to prioritise those with less. In your example above it’s not ideal but if the pensioners mentioned own a rental house plus at least where they live too, they are likely in a far better financial position than their tenants and could likely survive on the pension for a little while. It may not be particularly fair but those with more should try to help those with less during such uncertain times.
@Craic_a_tower:
Pensioners get the old age pension. Utility companies actually produce something.
Everyone is trying to pull together in this, everyone is suffering in some way. But as usual the landlords are playing victim already.
Cry me a river, people who WORK for a living are being made unemployed, landlords should just suck it up like most people are.
@Craic_a_tower: not much option but to accept what is happening. No tennant will pay rent now even any of them that can afford it. As soon as this is over very high number of private landlords will sell up
@Aidan: what you don’t seem to get is these people had options when initially investing. Some people invested in pension funds, businesses or property. Somebody getting a nice return from the shop they invested in or the pension fund. Those who invested in property when the government encouraged them to are now being asked to be a social service. They did produce something they saved many dereliction building and brought them back into service along with upgrading buildings. It is unreasonable to make one industry section subsidise the crisis. Yes some are less well off than others but not all and not everyone is out of work either.
The people who rented are now looking to break there leases as there is no work, college etc…. that is already effecting income.
@james foley: yes that is what some people actively want to happen. There in lies the problem, if that happens there will be a worse housing crisis.
@Craic_a_tower:
“people had options when initially investing”
Exactly, it’s an investment, it comes with risks. One major risk in any investment is change in public policy, natural disasters, major events, etc.
“It is unreasonable to make one industry section subsidise the crisis.”
What’s unreasonable is landlords thinking their income is more important than the income of WORKERS who lost their jobs.
Suck it up landlord, maybe you should have invested in a business instead of being a rent seeker. Adam Smith had some good words for your lot.
So you are going to be happy that no industries get any state support? Why single out landlords as the industry that take the brunt? It will have massive knock on effects to other industries including construction. Landlords work in order to provide a service and that is where your view is shown up. You want landlords to suffer because of your view of them not for economic or reasonable understanding. Read some more economics and maybe you could try to comprehend and put your feelings aside. If the rentals disappear the housing crisis will be much worse.
@: landlords don’t work???
@Aidan: why do most people think all landlords are greedy wealthy people sitting back rubbing their hands thinking of all the money they are making. When in fact it’s the opposite for many. We are accidental landlords, we can’t afford to have 2 or 3 months without rent as we still pay a high mortgage for the rental property. Also we pay 53% tax on that rental income every year so for rent of €1000 p/m we pay €530 in tax but the mortgage is still €950 so get your calculator out and add that up. By the way if we could sell we would but the house is in about €20000 negative equity so not all landlords are greedy little so and so’s
@Aidan: why do most people think all landlords are greedy wealthy people sitting back rubbing their hands thinking of all the money they are making. When in fact it’s the opposite for many. We are accidental landlords, we can’t afford to have 2 or 3 months without rent as we still pay a high mortgage for the rental property. Also we pay 53% tax on that rental income every year so for rent of €1000 p/m we pay €530 in tax but the mortgage is still €950.. By the way if we could sell we would but the house is in about €20000 negative equity so not all landlords are greedy little so and so’s
@Craic_a_tower:
“Why single out landlords as the industry that take the brunt?”
Because they don’t build anything, produce anything, provide no surplus value (ringing a plumber is not surplus value).
“Read some more economics” read some yourself, Adam Smith himself had a pretty poor view of landlords. If rents are frozen the houses won’t disappear.
@fitzz30:
“Also we pay 53% tax on that rental income” false. You pay income tax like everyone else, which is about 48% at the top marginal rate, so only happens if you have a full time job that brings you to the top tax rate. It also assumes you don’t incorporate or make use of any tax deductions.
Stop lying about taxes, you pay income tax, there’s no special landlord tax (but plenty of special landlord tax breaks).
@fitzz30:
“boo hoo I have to pay income tax just like the filthy tenants who work for their income”
You’re lying about tax. You don’t pay 53%, the top rate of income tax including PRSI + USC and all the rest comes to about 48%. That also ignores the lower rates of tax you pay on the first 35k of income.
Sick of landlords lying about their tax rates.
THERE IS NO SPECIAL LANDLORD TAX, JUST INCOME TAX + PRSI + USC, THE SAME TAX PEOPLE WHO WORK FOR THE MONEY PAY
@fitzz30: I am in the very same situation as you plus pyrite which makes it impossible to sell due to the previous government rules that anyone who buys a house with pyrite after 2012 ought to have known better so we are stuck with the house. As soon as the schools closed (the day the rent was due) the four previously working tennants stopped paying the rent….we didn’t buy this as an investment, we have this house as a noose around our necks but are seen as investors presumably with a portfolio.
@: so all the apartments built for renting didn’t produce anything? By the same measure banks don’t produce anything nor insurance. The buildings that landlords saved from demolition produced nothing?
Read some more economics still stands if you can only go by one person who who is dead over 200 years. Financial structures and economics have changed in that time and his objections to landlords was lead by his moral beliefs more so than anything else. You might as well quote Freud about psychology because even though he is the father of psychology his beliefs are no longer followed as more was learnt. Read more economics and you might understand.
@Craic_a_tower: if renters lose their job and can’t pay that’s one thing but the tone here is about a rent holiday. That can’t happen. Landlords bye in large have mortgages so it would be only fair that there was a mortgage holiday
@: you don’t understand tax rates. Yes a landlord can easily pay 53% on rental income. Just need to be self employed. Say if you brought a derelict house and did it up yourself as a tradesman then rent it out you will pay that in tax once you have no mortgage. Apparently that isn’t working to you and produced nothing.
@Craic_a_tower: get a grip on yourself ,
Do you know how ridiculous you come across .
@Fiona Krijnen: well what an amazing concise well argued point. You certainly showed I am being ridiculous.
@Fiona Krijnen: the ones who sound ridiculous are the ones who seem to think that landlords with rental properties should exist, should provide a service but should not benefit in anyway from it.
@Craic_a_tower:
You’re just lying. 53% is a complete lie, you don’t pay extra taxes for being self employed until you make over 100,000 euro, and even then the extra 3% only applies to that income earned over 100,000 euro.
You people just keep lying about tax, if you made 150,000 euro as a self employed landlord you would pay 66,000 euro, that’s 44% tax, not 53%, so stop lying. Here: https://download.pwc.com/ie/budget-2020/income-tax-calculator.html
Now, let’s get real, if you’re crazy money on rental income and it’s your primary source of income, then you should set up a private limited company and transfer your property to it, then you pay 25% tax on rental income.
Landlords are constantly on the journal lying about their taxes and I’ve really had enough of it. If your taxes are so bad INCORPORATE, not my fault you don’t know how to run a business.
@Craic_a_tower:
You’re lying about 53%, that’s a completely fictional tax rate. You pay I N C O M E tax, which is not 53%. The only extra tax self employed people pay is 3% extra on income earned over 100,000 euro a year, and frankly, if you’re making that much, you can afford the extra marginal 3%.
Stop lying about your taxes. Funny how the fictional figure you lot throw out keeps going up. First it was 50% (a lie), then 52% (another lie), now 53% (lies again). It’s nothing close to that.
@: you really don’t know what you are talking about. I said you can easily pay 53% tax on rental income if you are self employed is a fact. You claim there is no special tax on landlords. It is taxed differently to all other investments and businesses so it is special. It is treated as income not a business and it was changed to be like that recently after decades of being treated like a business. You hate landlords I get it but you also don’t understand tax nor economics. You are wilfully ignorant on the subject. I am looking after my tenants but I am not the social services and will not give my service away for free when my tenants income is reduced. They will get a reduced rent for a while but I know they would have more money between the state and not paying.
@Craic_a_tower:
I provided my sources, now you provide yours. Explain to me how your arrive at this fictional 53% figure. The only extra taxes you can be paying as a self employed person are the 3% marginal rate.
You’re lying.
@Craic_a_tower:
Income tax + PRSI + USC is not 53%. You have the option of incorporating. Any self-employed worker is taxed the same way unless they incorporate.
Stop lying about your taxes and provide sources for your false claim.
Reply once or it shows you are in a rage. You didn’t look correctly so never provided proof. You are simply wrong. Self employed people have an extra 1% USC after 100k. That means rental income has that extra percent so 53%.
@Craic_a_tower:
It’s a 3% surcharge, and it only applies to income above 100,000 a year. Even then, it doesn’t add up to 53%, you’re pulling figures out of your hole.
What’s a WORKER, as opposed to a worker? What about landlords who are workers/WORKERS losing their job as well. I know a landlord who is a worker/WORKER about to be laid off. Should he have to pay his mortgage and the rental properties mortgage as well with no income? Maybe he should say “suck it up WORKER, you should have got safer employment”, except he’d be talking to himself.
Do you actually work?
Get educated as in your figures you forgot vat. Which would need to be charged at 23,%
@Craic_a_tower: Making money without actually doing anything or producing anything to earn it is immoral, it’s as simple as that. If you have more of a scarce resource than you need for your own use and you choose not to share it with your fellow man, you are a bad person. End of story. Many of us have absolutely no sympathy for those who are choosing to *hoard* a scarce resource even though they don’t need it for themselves, just so they can exploit their fellow humans’ need for it by charging as much as they can get away with, with no regard for how it impacts others’ quality of life.
The world is moving on from the idea of housing as an “asset” and not as something with a societal value which should not be left at the mercy of profit-seeking freed. That day cannot come quickly enough as far as I’m concerned.
Not opposed to this but if rent doesn’t have to be paid neither should the associated mortgage.
@Graham Manning: Agree and hopefully I don’t have to go through this process with my own tenants as is day or will be a nightmare to deal with. Credit ratings can’t be impacted either for tenant or landlord.
@Graham Manning: Mortgage holders and renters are going to be thrown to the wolves as usual. That is very clear now based on recent reports.
@Graham Manning: Someone always pays, the renter, the mortgage payer or the tax payer.
@Graham Manning: and after this is all over rents will inevitably drop. Will there be a scheme to subsidise landlords in the same way that there was rent controls. So if we limit the top we should also limit the bottom
Vote SF! Free stuff for everyone!
@FrontSeatDriver: Don’t be silly.
@FrontSeatDriver: Disappointing that shinners only contribution during #COVID19 has been cheap vote grabbing soundbites.
We are so lucky MaryLoonie is NOT Taoiseach. SF have and always will be bad for your health.
@Ger Murphy: Mary Lou ,her health spokesperson,all the other leaders and their health spokespersons, Government and their medical expert advisors and other experts have been meeting regularly every week!There is cross party support for coronavirus pandemic measures and all other political parties have been putting forwards suggestions too.
Pearse Doherty has put forward suggestions re insurance,finance,mortgages,etc, Eoin O Broin has put forwards suggestions re rents, landlords,etc &Simon Coveney has thanked him for his efforts re people trapped abroad at the moment,etc
So your frappe room type comment is beyond contempt!
We’re all been affected by this,we have vulnerable family members,we have frontline staff who are family members,our communities are affected by this,our livelihoods are affected by this,our children are affected by this,our mental health can be affected by this,we are concerned,we are worried!
@FrontSeatDriver: Don’t start the SF HQ Stooges going. It’s too early in the morning for them.
@David Corrigan: Still shooting down free speech I see.
@David Corrigan: I see the kids are overexcited again, poor things.
@FrontSeatDriver: yeah just let’s hope they keep their magic money tree alive (aka the middle classes and hard working majority on the country)
@Val Doyle: Good man Val. You are playing a blinder.
@Cormac Laffan: They are off again Cormac.
@FrontSeatDriver: Perhaps you could explain how this caretaker government still have no control concerning the banks or employers and big business who take advantage of the plight we now find ourselves in. In case it has escaped your memory, how many times did FFG tell us there was no money to support public services .The recent Nurses strike, certainly no money for that.. Now Vareadka and Harris praise our nurses from the rooftops.. Hypocrisy at it’s best. Everything for free. Maybe you should read the report concerning Nama , the one Pascal O’Donough sat on for months .. and was unreported that it came into the public domain yesterday.
Nobody paying for anything is not a sustainable economic policy. With everything now closed, and the government paying salaries, many people should have plenty of funds when normality resumes.
@sean de paore: Not exactly, I like many others pay exorbitant rents, so this shutdown has made no difference to me and I couldn’t afford to do anything except survive even before. This is from a household with 2 incomes. We are paying for government housing policy and paying big time, the government needs to step in to fix a broken market.
@sean de paore: This only works if there’s a total moratorium on all bills, from banks to landlords to council rates to utilities, until society is up and running again. And that’s exactly the kind of radical approach we should be taking.
This implies landlords are getting a deal when they get a moratorium. A moratorium is like a credit card, free-now-pay-later, it just kicks debt down the road for later.
@Peter J McCarthy: I think this amendment is ill-thought. On the surface it sounds good but dig a little and you see it gets complicated quickly. Eoin doesnt want renters to build up debt for unpaid rent… but owners will build up debt on their mortgage. Rent reductions are poe in the sky. This was already looked at after the last crash and the govt. cannot get involved in private contracts. This is what is annoying about SF. Populist, attention grabbing soundbites with very little thought and no learning from even recent history.
if government could give free tax from rent for private Landlords , I believe they will accept lower rents from tenants be paid due outbreak…
@Margarita Si Marcel: Not sure no tax is the answer here. The country is on its knees already.I’ve reduced my tenants rent already by a third an agreement we came to together(his wife has lost her job but he is working full time from home) I reached out through the agency that rents it for me. I will still pay my taxes but for the reduced rate. I had put them on 4 months notice as I want to sell but completely accept that’s out the window for the next few months. We all have to do the right thing here, we shouldn’t need the government to tell us.
@Margarita Si Marcel: a lot would because most are sound. A good few won’t though.
@Droyal: Fair play. You were very fair in how you dealt with the situation.
@Droyal: I just posted this positive news on Twitter:
Good News! I had to move till end of May as Landlord wanted to sell the house, but last evening I got Message from My Landlord:
Hi, I Hope you and your family are well and staying safe. Just to let you know that we will not be asking you to move house anytime soon.Stay safe and let me know if you need anything.
Landlord
@Margarita Si Marcel: that’s brilliant no one should have any unnecessary stress at such a stressful time. Genuinely delighted for you.
Landlords playing victim and crying about income tax (we all pay) & mortgages (investments into their net worth) in 3… 2… 1…
So why should landlords provide free housing.
@james foley:
Why should nurses risk their lives for peanuts? (Healthcare workers have a higher mortality rate due to exposure time increasing severity)
Why should I pay ~40% of my overall income in taxes, after working hard to gain it?
Why should the defense forces be camping in their barracks 24/7 for no extra pay, waiting for the call?
Why should business owners be closing shop to protect their workers when they haven’t been ordered to?
We live in a society, everyone is trying to pull together to get through this, but as usual the landlords stand alone shouting “ME ME ME ME ME”
What a useless part of society, they build nothing, produce nothing, they buy a property and get free money, then cry about having to pay tax on it.
@james foley:
“[Landlords] are the only one of the three orders whose revenue costs them neither labour nor care, but comes to them, as it were, of its own accord, and independent of any plan or project of their own. That indolence, which is the natural effect of the ease and security of their situation, renders them too often, not only ignorant, but incapable of that application of mind” – Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
So where do you think these properties come from? Hard work and planning for the future for the most. Putting your hard earned cash into your bank amounts to nothing where buying a property and renting it out houses people and earns you money on your investment
@: that is just lying. The hotel and restaurants have asked for state aid. Trainee nurses are getting paid when they wouldn’t. The government is paying people out of work more than normal rates. Renting a property is not free money nor work free I have dealt with domestic abuse, addicts, threats, physical attacks etc… as a landlord. I have a tenant moving out after 30 years as the state finally will provide her with a property. I have driven tenants to hospital appointments and in emergencies.
I full accept there will be lost rent I just don’t think it is zero especially considering they still have income. In some cases by not paying rent and getting state aid they will have more money in their pockets and that certainly shouldn’t happen. You want landlords start with that on posts
@: Your bitterness toward people who you presume are in a better position in life than you is pathetically obvious. Nurses choose to work as nurses with full knowledge of the salary attached, as do defence forces. As you said, landlords BUY (with money) property and get a return for the provision of that property for use by tenants. This is not a social service. Again your reference to Adam Smith supposes that the only useful part of society are farmers and tradespeople. Stop trying to impress people with archaic quotes by redundant economists and try to do something about your lot rather than drowning in jealousy.
Yes, they buy the property with a big bag of gold that the found at the end of a rainbow so they could collect the free money. Calling people who “build nothing, produce nothing and get free money” a useless part of society is a dangerous argument to make – that could be applied to a wide range of groups.
@james foley: Because hoarding a scarce resource when you don’t need it for yourself is fundamentally immoral. If you’re not living in it, you shouldn’t own it.
So Sinn Féin TDs now write articles for the journal.ie? Genuine question have the journal published articles from other TDs and if so what range of parties were they members of?
Won’t bother paying taxes due on rental income either
@Mickey Finn:
If you don’t want to pay taxes on your 2nd source of income (rent income) then it should be people who only have 1 source of income (from working) that should not be paying tax.
Why isn’t Government considering David Mc Williams’s radical proposals re ‘helicopter money’s(March ’17 David Mc Williams’s podcast!)during this coronavirus pandemic emergency?That’s the problem with either FF or FG in Government,they wouldn’t agree and now both going into Government together!
I fear yet again ordinary people,workers etc will feel the most impact of consequences of this National Emergency and be left to deal with the consequences afterwards …..this can’t happen!If only SF were in a Government or an emergency National Unity Government!
Landlords, particularly landlords with smaller number of properties need to get financial supports as well as renters,it’s the right thing to do.
Obviously some who lose their jobs will need help but a blanket across the board no evictions makes it sound like nobody needs to pay rent and no consequences because people will take advantage of this, not only people who lost their jobs but some who haven’t will chance their arms. Also for example, a couple who both recently lost their jobs, now getting 350 each a week, that’s over 3000 a month combined. If they now decided to not pay a penny more on their rent or mortgage, they’d probably have more left at the end of the month than before they lost their jobs, I know I would.
Ah the Journal left mouthpiece.
@Joe: disgraceful allowing sitting TD to use this publication as a political platform. It is also hilarious to think that people come on here and accuse them of being a government supporter.
FF and FG are absolutely nuts going into government now. Let this crowd at it and see what they call do with the mess it leaves behind because if they don’t SF will wipe the boards with them next time around.
IRES REIT, anyone heard anything from the biggest landlord in the country?
Wh not? Everybody else has to pay up sooner or later. If they are not paying their rent, the rent should go up for a period to allow all arrears to be repaid in full.
We can always make more money but this is a pandemic. Let’s not forget business can right off losses against tax. Gain the same advantage as banks. Renters must be protected. Landlords are a business and should register as a business.
The real question is how long will this emergency contuine. When we lift distancing rules will it reignite another wave and how many waves before a vaccine. I have heard a vaccine could take 18 months. Then it has to be rolled out worldwide. Some jobs will return in months but some could take years. Who’s going to travel?
@leartius: they specifically don’t allow landlords to register as a business. They treat it differently to investment and businesses for tax.
As the saying goes:
“Its easier to move Moses to the mountain than the mountain to Moses”
So those who dont like/cant afford renting in Dublin, just move to where cheap housing is available :
have your say